To coordinate guest processing activities, Veeam Backup & Replication deploys a runtime process on the VM guest OS. The process runs only during guest processing and is stopped immediately after the processing is finished (depending on the selected option, during the backup job session or after the backup job completes).

You must specify a user account that will be used to connect to the VM guest OS and deploy the runtime process:

From the Guest OS credentials list, select a user account with local administrator privileges on the VM guest OS. If you have not set up credentials beforehand, click the Manage accounts link or click Add on the right to add credentials. For more information, see Guest Processing.

Note that for Veeam Backup & Replication version 9.5 Update 3a and later, the account used for guest OS processing must have the following user rights assigned:

Logon as a batch job granted

Deny logon as a batch job not set

Local accounts do not support Kerberos authentication. To authenticate with Microsoft Windows guest OS using Kerberos, specify an Active Directory account.

By default, Veeam Backup & Replication uses the Log on as a batch job policy to connect to guest OS. If the connection fails, Veeam Backup & Replication switches to Interactive Logon.

Note:

[For Kerberos authentication] Mind the following:

Networkless application-aware guest processing through VMware VIX/vSphere Web Services is not supported for VMs with guest OS where NTLM is restricted.

By default, Veeam Backup & Replication uses the same credentials for all VMs in the job. If some VM requires a different user account, click Credentials and enter custom credentials for the VM.

If you have added Microsoft Windows VMs to the job, specify which guest interaction proxy Veeam Backup & Replication can use to deploy the runtime process on the VM guest OS. On the right of the Guest interaction proxy field, click Choose.

Select Use the selected guest interaction proxy servers only to explicitly define which servers will perform the guest interaction proxy role. The list of servers contains Microsoft Windows servers added to the backup infrastructure.

To check if Veeam Backup & Replication can communicate with VMs added to the job and deploy the runtime process on their guest OSes, click Test Now. Veeam Backup & Replication will use the specified credentials to connect to all VMs in the list.

Note:

The guest interaction proxy functionality is available in the Enterprise and Enterprise Plus Editions of Veeam Backup & Replication.